Christmas Carol 5K

Another fun Sunday run, this time in City Park. It was pretty darn cold though. I don't think my quads warmed up until I was almost done.

Results:

Chip Time:00:41:34

Overall Place/Total: 563/799

Pace: 13:42

Sexplace/Sextotal: 349 /523

Divplace/Divtotal: 77 /107

Stocking 5K

It was a lovely Saturday morning, a little chilly at first but the sun was quite cooperative and allowed me to have a nice little jog at the Superior Stocking Run 5K event. The goodie bag was awesome: tons of Cliff bars, a little jingle bell bracelet, and other miscellaneous samples. The after run snacks were yummy: homemade chocolate chip banana bread, hot cocoa, and other tasty treats.

My run time, not so awesome but pretty average (40:59).

 

Much of the run was through neighborhoods and they were kind of hilly. (and I know it wasn't just me who thought that because several other folks were talking about it during the after party).

Overall a nice day and a nice run. I'll have to keep this one in mind for next year.

Running in T-Town

Since I knew I would be in Topeka for Thanksgiving I looked to see if there were any 5K events I could participate in to help offset the Thanksgiving feast (not to mention my sister's cupcake creations). On Active.com I found The Rescue Run, a 5K event to benefit the Topeka Rescue Mission. Although it was a night event and I prefer morning runs, I signed up.

Here's me crossing the finish line (photo compliments of www.SeeKCrun.com). My only complaint is they started everyone at the same time even though there was a crowd of people so my chip time would have been a little better (maybe by a minute) than what you see on the clock. My official time was 42:17.9 with a pace of 13:38/M. Not spectacular but pretty average for my 5K times.

And this song was playing on Pandora as I finished up and crossed the line - loved that!


The really cool part was that after the 5K was over they had a Christmas Parade.

 And here's me with my sweet little niece Jenna.

*Thanks to hubby for taking the two pictures above.

Early Turkey Trot

This Saturday I participated in the Brighton Turkey Trot. It was a lovely sunny Saturday morning (also my husband's birthday but he didn't mind that I spent the morning trotting along instead of eating birthday cake).

Here's my results from their email:

Thanks for participating in the Brighton Turkey Trot 5K Run.

You placed 566th out of 678 finishers in a time of 41:46 for a pace of 13:27 per 
mile.

Your chip time was 41:20.

Out of 389 women you finished 305th. The winning time for women was 17:58.

For 40 to 44 year old women you were 43rd out of 55 finishers. The winning time 
for your age and sex was 22:39.

Not too exciting - pretty typical for me for a 5K. Someday I hope to actually run one! 

Run the Rocks 2012

Since I've been working out at Red Rocks all summer I thought a good way to end it would be to participate in the Run the Rocks 5K event to benefit the American Lung Association.It was a beautiful day and the first two miles were awesome (they were pretty much all down hill). The last 1.1 mile was UPHILL and then up the stairs to the amphitheater. I thought I was going to die. And, as you can see by my time, I didn't do as well as I usually do in 5K events. But, I finished it! And I'm hoping I can do better next year.

And here's my bling! I love racing bling!

Sunday 5K

After spending Saturday watching an Indiana Jones movie marathon at my local AMC (all four movies: 10:30am-7:30pm) I thought it would be a good idea to do a 5K race on Sunday morning. It probably would have been better if my meals on Saturday had consisted of more than:
PreBonza bodies workout snack: pear and almond butter
PostBonza bodies workout snack: larabar (banana nut)
Breakfast: 1 egg, 1 egg white omelet with green chili
Lunch: almonds and small movie popcorn
Snack: waffle fries at the movies
Dinner: Skinny cow vanilla ice cream sandwich

I arrived at the Panerathon at 7:15am to get my packet, attach my bib and timing chip and stretch out. At 8am we were off! I started the first mile with a nice 12 minute pace and was feeling pretty good. However, after that the energy drained quickly and I finally made it across the finish line with a net time of 42:05 (pace of 13:35). Not great. But I looked up my time for the same race in 2010 and it was a nettime of 46:56 (pace of 15:09). So an improvement! I'll take it. And next time I'll fuel up for it correctly.

Best thing about the Panerathon has got to be the post race grub:

Sunday (Sundae)

Another goal this month is to be very strict with the "no sugar, no wheat, no dairy" rules. I was rather wishy washy about it last month but even so I think it was helpful.

Food:
Smoothie (1 c Silk unsweetened almond milk, 1 TBSP ground peanuts, 1 TBSP chia seeds, 1TBSP rice protein powder)
1 egg + 1 egg white omelet with chopped chicken breast and salsa
Larabar = cherry pie
Salad (1/2 c black beans, romaine lettuce, chopped chicken breast, salsa, tomato)
Watermelon
1 packet of guacamole
1 bag of rice chips (eaten over the course of the afternoon - I just can't open these dang things up because I'll keep snacking until it's empty) 
2 turkey burgers
Exercise:
Since Sunday is usually a pretty mellow day I just did a 20 minute soak in the hot tub with 10 minutes walking in the pool, then I got my 90 minute massage. Ahhhhhhhh

We finally had the birthday celebration for my sister (her birthday was last month) and instead of going out to a restaurant (as originally planned) they decided to come to my house and bring BBQ and a Dairy Queen Ice Cream Cake.  I was pretty proud of myself for not eating ANY of it. While I like the DQ ice cream cake I didn't feel strongly compelled to eat it and was happy to see it go. Now if it would have been a DQ peanut buster parfait I might have caved.

September, already?

Where does the time go?
My goal this month is to do a daily blog post (which sometimes will only consist of what I ate and how much I exercised that day).
Today (Saturday) I got up at 4:45am, went to the gym and did 30 minutes on the elliptical machine. Then back home for a quick bite (pear and almonds), sliced up an apple to eat on the way and headed up to Red Rocks for my Bonza workout.

Got back home around 8:45am, ate a 3 egg white/1 whole egg omelet with salsa and 1/2 avocado, checked email and other such internet stuff, iced my knees then changed clothes to get ready to ride our bikes downtown (I had to do a "half way done" weigh in and nutrition discussion at Bonza Bodies).
Headed to 9 Mile station in the car with bikes on the back and hit the trail around 10:20am. What an awesome ride downtown. Took about 1hr and 10 minutes to make it.
After the 2 hour meeting where we learned more about proper nutrition, stress relief and some good stretching techniques Josh and I had lunch at a Kabob food truck (I had the lamb and beef plate (including 3 tasty dolmas). I gave my pita to a homeless guy (I felt kind of like I was saying "hey homeless person, here's some nutritionally devoid food that I won't put in my body but I'll give you to put in yours" but he appeared appreciative).
Decided that since the way home was mostly uphill and there were some dark clouds forming we would just take the light rail back (and use my free 1 way 3 zone passes I got from the coupon book from the Step Up for Cancer event last month). On the way back I ate my larabar (banana nut bread, yum). Got home, took a shower, iced my knees again (they are not very happy with all the activity) then headed out to Sports Authority so I could use my $9.90 rebate coupon before it expired on Monday. I wanted to get a pair of bike gloves but they didn't have any that I liked so I got a 3 pack of crazy neon socks and some sharkies for my dad. We checked out Target for the bike gloves but no luck there either. Perhaps biking is considered seasonal and it's going out of season? I did see some super cute Alice in Wonderland little girls clothes. I had to restrain myself from buying a bunch for the nieces (the prices were not that great considering the quality).
Next stop, King Soopers for some roasted chicken and salad fixings for dinner. I also had a couple pieces of the dolma samples (must be a dolma kind of day). I talked Josh into getting a pineapple and cutting that up for dessert (love my pineapple). Dinner was a bed of romaine lettuce, 1/2 chicken breast (shredded), the other 1/2 of the avocado, tomato, and a mix of balsamic vinegar with olive oil and cracked pepper. Settled in to watch the season premier of Dr. Who - love that we get BBC America now!

Food:
pear
apple
almonds
3 egg whites
1 whole egg
salsa
1/2 avocado
coffee w/silk almond milk
Lamb/beef at kabob stand
lettuce w/tomato
dolmas (3)
Larabar - Banana nut bread
dolma pieces (2)
chicken breast
tomato
romaine lettuce
balsamic vinegar and olive oil
almonds
1/2 avocado
pineapple

Exercise:
Elliptical at gym = 30 minutes
Bonza Bodies workout at Red Rocks = 60 minutes
Biking downtown (11 miles) = 1 hour 10 minutes

I'm so ready for my massage tomorrow morning.

p.s. I gained 3 lbs but was down in body fat (I didn't catch how much) - I blame it on Vegas.

What condition my condition was in

Great movie, great song. But what condition is your condition in? It appears most of America's condition is not so good

In fact some people are recommending that physical inactivity becomes a medical diagnosis. They say if we can regulate smoking and seat belt wearing we can regulate activity. What do you think?

Red Rocks Pre and Post

Way back in March I signed up for the Red Rocks Fitness Challenge.

The 13 workouts at Red Rocks on Saturday mornings at 7am were awesome (tough but awesome). Saturday July 28th was the last one and on Sunday the 29th I went in for my post assessment. Here's how I did in three months:

Number of pushups in 1 minute: BEFORE = 16 AFTER = 29 (that's 13 more!)

Number of sit ups in 1 minute: BEFORE = 13 AFTER = 21 (that's 8 more!)

Number of step ups in 3 minutes: BEFORE = 103 AFTER = 109 (that's only 6 more but an increase is an increase)

Resting heart rate: BEFORE = 70 AFTER = 58

I lost 9 pounds, 1.6% of body fat and a total of 12.5" from my chest, waist, hips and right arm.

I'd say I kicked butt!

Greatness

Have you seen the new ad campaign from Nike? There's a whole slew of spots - just google Nike Greatness and enjoy.

You are what you eat

It seems the "eat less, move more" mantra is not quite as simple as that. This study found evidence for diet having more of an impact on weight loss than exercise. Specifically, making smarter choices, which involves consuming fewer processed foods, is what contributes the MOST to weight loss. That's not to say exercise isn't important (oh, you thought you would get out of going to the gym? Nope!) I have to say I think I agree with the study. Since I have been consuming mostly whole foods I have noticed differences in weight loss as well as hunger levels. Eating things that take my body more time to digest helps me stay fuller, longer. I thought I would share with you some of my favorite meals starting with my go to breakfast smoothie:
Mya's Breakfast Smoothie:
I really love McDonald's Mango/Pineapple fruit smoothie.

But at 220 calories for a 12oz cup (not to mention 49 grams of sugar) I think I'll have to save that for special occasions (Thanks McDonald's for having such complete nutrition info on your website). My substitution? I use my awesome Magic bullet to create a healthy, yet still tasty, alternative:

1) Fage 0% yogurt - 1/2 cup 2) NUTRIBIOTIC VEGAN RICE PROTEIN Vanilla - 1 heaping TBSP 3) Random assorted berries (whatever I've thrown in the freezer for the week: blueberries, blackberries, strawberries, raspberries, snozberries...) 4) Crystal Light - 1/2 cup of whatever I've got mixed up in the pitcher Blend it all up for a breakfast that's good and yummers! For 3 WW PointsPlus it's a total winner (okay, maybe doesn't taste EXACTLY like McDonald's but it's cheaper and is much better for you - 35 grams of protein compared to McDonald's measly 3 is a total WIN). You could probably add Splenda or some other artificial sweetener to it but there's already some in the Crystal Light and I try to stay away from that as much as possible.

In my next post I'll talk about my other go to breakfast...Cheerios!

Obesity epidemic

This looks interesting. Too bad I don't get HBO.




An article by Liz Monte on Portion Size makes me think hummmm, could this have something to do with contributing to the epidemic?

And how about this article that says sitting (and lack of exercise) is just as deadly as smoking?

I just finished up the Red Rocks Fitness Challenge on Saturday (more on my pre/post assessment results in a later post) and on Wednesday, Aug 1st I'll start the Bonza Body 8 week challenge!

And I think I'll do the Step up for cancer event this weekend. How about you?

Swimming towards pie

This is why I online do Weight Watchers online now. I know "they" say that going to group meetings is helpful in weight loss but so many times the people there would just be so whiny and would complain about not being able to eat the whole pie or not being able to drink ALL the water (seriously people, 64 oz of water is NOT that much in a day. I down that before work). One complaint I will always remember is the woman who was so upset because she loved Arby's Market Fresh sandwiches but they were 18 POINTS (this was before the Points plus system but I'm sure they are still quite high. For those not familiar with WW, the points you can have per day depend on your weight but generally range from 18 to 32 - so you can see why an 18 point meal was not a good idea). The leader kept trying to help her figure out how she could have "some" of the sandwich (since the whole point of WW is to not deprive yourself and you can eat whatever you want within reason) but this woman didn't want to eat just half the sandwich or only eat the sandwich once a month...she wanted that whole freaking sandwich on what seemed like a daily basis. I really wanted to jump up and say "just eat the freaking sandwich, stop coming to WW and be fat the rest of your life because that's what's going to happen". Life is all about choices and this woman was choosing to eat the sandwich but didn't want to face the consequences. And she though if she made enough excuses as to WHY she couldn't just have half, or WHY she couldn't just eat it once in a while that would justify it (and she would lose weight). So I log my points online and I don't go to meetings. I read inspiration blogs like BitchCakes and WW's CEO. And I try not to swim towards pie.

Eat less, move more

It's always amazing to me how people can be so quick to follow crazy fads that have them eating strange foods in unusual combinations, or taking pills that can cause oily discharge but when faced with the idea of simply eating less and moving more they scoff. Yet another research study has been cited that says the people who are successful at weight loss are the ones who eat less (especially less fat) and move more.

So let's MOVE IT!

Rule #1: Cardio

Yet another reason to work out - we all saw what happened in Zombieland to the fatties!

Research has shown...

As someone who is trained in research methods and the importance of empirical evidence I'm always on the lookout for what current research says about weight loss, healthy eating, weight maintenance, etc.

I came across this article today that discusses a research study that found couch potatoes who get 1-2 hours of moderate exercise a day are just as bad off as those who don't exercise at all when it comes to longevity. Essentially the more hours you sit, the less likely you will live as long. And here's the shocking part: that's true even if you freaking exercise for 2 hours of the day - if you sit for the rest of the day you a goner (especially if you sit longer than 8 hours a day). In this study, exercise didn't decrease sitting time.

Of course, the researchers say that exercise has other benefits (blood pressure, weight maintenance, etc.) so they aren't saying you might as well just sit down. But what they are saying is that you shouldn't fool yourself into thinking if you run 5 miles in the morning you can sit on your butt the rest of the day.

Now I don't know about you but I have a desk job. It's really hard to work at a computer standing up. I know there are people who have "standing desks" but that just seems kind of strange to me (and I'm pretty sure my work isn't going to install those any time soon). So what's a girl to do? The message I took away was keep up the daily exercise but try to make sure I get up frequently throughout the day.

I do take a 30 minute walk at lunch. I try to get up and walk to coworker's offices to ask questions instead of emailing. And I drink enough water to have to make a trip to the bathroom every hour or so (I know, TMI). Hopefully it's this extra effort to keep moving as often as possible throughout the day that will help keep the grim reaper away, at least until the zombie apocalypse. But that's a whole different issue.